WestSouthwest

On WestSouthwest, a broadcast journalist comes to Kalamazoo this month to discuss what it means to be a descendent of Thomas Jefferson and slave Sally Hemmings. And we get the latest report on campaign fundraising and spending in Michigan.

When Shannon LaNier was a boy, he told his classmates that President Thomas Jefferson was his great grandfather. His teacher didn't see how that was possible--LaNier looks black. She instructed him to stop lying. Today, he says, DNA and other evidence supports the story that had been passed down in his family of its connection to Jefferson and enslaved woman Sally Hemings. LaNier speaks in Kalamazoo on Feb. 27.

Two state Senate races in Southwest Michigan are among those attracting large amounts of campaign contributions. One for a Republican primary and one for a general election rematch of the closest and most expensive state Senate race four years ago.